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“Cleanliness next to godliness” is an old expression aimed at teaching children that, next to being godly Christians, being neat and tidy is a top priority.
While keeping a clean house is a great goal, Christians know that the most important cleansing we need every day happens not on physical surfaces but in the conscience.
God’s holy law, summarized in the Ten Commandments, shows us our sins and guilt before God, and it reminds us of God’s threat: “The wages of sin is death,” Romans 6:23. And as Jesus said, “Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him (God) who can destroy both soul and body in hell,” Matthew 10:28. And Satan, our chief enemy, constantly is pointing to our soiled conscience and saying, “Death and hell are coming for you!”
The only thing that can cleanse our conscience is the Gospel, the Good News that God offers forgiveness of sins and eternal salvation freely for the sake of Jesus the Savior, who died for our sins and was raised for our justification. The Christian’s righteousness before God is God’s gift to the Christian for the sake of Jesus. We cannot cleanse our blighted conscience by works, by providing God with proof of our own righteousness.
Our conscience is cleansed by the saving, forgiving blood of Christ, as God’s Word says, “For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God. Therefore, he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant,” Hebrews 9:13-15.
In other words, if the Old Testament blood sacrifices could do outward purifications for the Hebrews, then certainly the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ can purge our consciences from guilt and from works righteousness — the blood of Christ is like Clorox for our conscience: it purifies our consciences by removing our guilt and declaring us righteous and forgiven. The blood of Jesus Christ, the New Testament in Jesus’ blood, opens the gates of Paradise. When we apply this truth of the Gospel to our sinful situation, we find salvation from eternal damnation on account of our sins and are rescued from an oppressively evil conscience that can find no relief in our own efforts and works.
Of course, we do have to train our consciences to be active, constantly judging sin and doctrine according to God’s Word, the Holy Bible. We must strive to lead godly lives and not sin against our conscience. At the same time, we must humbly acknowledge the weakness of our faith and our constant need for God’s help.
Since we never become perfect saints this side of heaven, we need to have our consciences shaped and molded by the Word of God. Then, we will be convinced of the radical depth of our sinfulness and seek to have our consciences cleansed by the liberating forgiveness of sins delivered in the preaching of the Gospel and given out in the sacraments. Only with consciences sharpened and made sensitive by God’s demanding Law will we recognize our great need for Christ’s death in our place and God’s grace offered in the blood of Jesus.
But, if our consciences are flabby and inactive and are not formed by God’s Word, then the Christian faith will never make sense. It is only the sick who need a doctor, right? Once Martin Luther said that three things are necessary for everyone who desires to be saved. Like a sick person: 1) He must know what his sickness is; 2) He must know where the medicine is which will cure him; and 3) He must desire and seek the medicine, and have it brought to him.
Our sickness is that we are dead in sin. This is revealed to us by the Ten Commandments, which we have not kept. The medicine is God’s grace shown in Christ’s death and resurrection and given out by the Holy Spirit in the Christian Church. That is why Christians study God’s Word and gather for the Divine Service: to seek cleansing for our consciences, the cleansing of our guilt. We come into God’s presence with our filthy sins of thought, word and deed on our consciences, but by the Gospel our consciences becomes clean, cheerful and good, cleansed by the blood of Jesus. Amen.
